“Mark twice…cut ONCE” – a phrase that was drilled into my head as a resident by one of my mentors.

One of the first parts of any procedure that you have to commit to is the location and type of the incision you make. A poorly placed or badly planned incision can make the procedure difficult, prolong the surgical time, and cause excessive damage due to retraction, etc. Anatomy is an obvious guide to incisional planning, but after viewing this lecture presentation online you will have a comprehensive understanding of the many other factors that must be considered.

As a practitioner, one of the key points of patient dissatisfaction will be their surgical scars. While there are treatments for problematic and painful surgical scars, it is certainly advantageous to minimize their occurrence with proper planning and technique. Curvilinear incisions, relaxed skin tension lines, and other surgical principles of incision planning are discussed in detail. Photographic and case examples help to emphasize this material and clinical scenarios are discussed. The lecture concludes with a brief review of tourniquets, their use and contraindications.